Today, we live in the most convenient times to attain Self-Realization or what some also like to call “Enlightenment”. Like never before, we now have an instant access to our most loved, admired, and authentic spiritual teachers, coaches, and motivational speakers. Media and technology have made it very easy for us to listen to our favorite idols wherever and whenever we want to.

Not only that but our favorite spiritual and motivational coaches have also started traveling throughout the world to meet people and to talk to them in person. Gone are the days when a disciple had to travel to a far away Gurukul (ashram) to meet their spiritual teacher and live with him for years until he has attained enlightenment. The teachings of our gurus are now easily available through their online blogs, books, speeches, TED talks, podcasts, social media accounts, YouTube videos, audio CDs, DVDs, so on and so forth.

These days, the urban spiritual teachers also add humor into their talks. They realize the reduced attention span of modern people and keep us entertained with their timely and witty jokes. They speak to us in a language that we can understand. They simplify the most complex spiritual concepts and processes for us. And yet, we fail to grasp the essence of their teachings! Have you ever asked yourself why? Why are we lacking the willingness to cooperate and collaborate with them?

Do you really think the spiritual masters need to travel all over the world for us? Do they need to be funny for our sake? Do they really need to have Facebook and Twitter accounts? Are they looking for fame or FB likes and tweets or even waiting for their posts to go viral? No! Authentic spiritual teachers require none of this. In fact, all of this requires tremendous resources like time, money, and energy. And yet they do this selfless service without thinking twice considering it their responsibility towards humanity. Spiritual teachers of today have changed themselves to fit into our modern trends and culture but we haven’t changed a bit to fit into theirs! They have opened up a portal for our spiritual awakening and are waiting to transport us to our original home but unfortunately we lack the capacity to absorb their wisdom and implement it in our lives.

Why is this happening? In spite of listening to them daily, why do the majority of us see no change in ourselves? When we hear them speak, we feel an instant fire deep within us and we feel like our motivation has been ignited. We feel energized instantly and are momentarily reborn and can take over the world. So what happens after you are done listening to their videos or after you are finished reading and re-posting their motivational quotes? Where does the motivation go after you close the books written by your idols? What happens to all the promises of self-improvement you make to yourself while listening to them? Why do you again feel the same emptiness inside that you had before listening to their talks?

I believe this happens to us because we are not willing to work on ourselves. The only difference between our idols and us is that they are constantly working on themselves and providing us wisdom gained from their experience. And where is this experience coming from? From the work they do within themselves! When we listen to them, we are only listening to the wisdom, which is a result of their experience on themselves. The effect of such wisdom will only be temporary on us. I call this “borrowed wisdom” and there is only so much somebody else’s wisdom can do for you. You cannot live your story based on somebody else’s truth. You need to find your own truth.

Your goal is not to simply follow your idols on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter and re-post their quotes. Your goal is not to be physically present with them or even desire them. Your goal is to become like them and even better! If you think simply reading or listening to their talks is going to make you whole, then I am going to tell you very honestly that if you personally do not work on yourself, you will still feel huge emptiness inside of yourself even if your idol is sitting right next to you. They can show you the way but cannot fill the emptiness inside you.

Remember, your spiritual goal is to actually implement their teachings in your life. How are you going to implement it in your life so that it has an everlasting effect on you? You have to continuously work on yourself and keep upgrading your Self! You will need to develop a deeper understanding of yourself; you will need to sit down and meditate. You need to make time for yourself. There are no shortcuts to awakening! You need to put in a lot of work.

Experience is necessary to awaken or to be enlightened. Do not make the mistake of thinking that your actions such as listening to spiritual teachers, reading literature or ancient scriptures is the ultimate experience. These are mere actions performed by you on a day-to-day basis and not the real experience itself. Experience only happens when you learn to experiment on yourself and become the end result of your experiment. Live your own story; be your own truth!

Happy National Pet Day y’all! 3 years ago, around this time, my 6-year-old Maahi came home from the veterinary ICU after going through a major spinal cord surgery for a herniated disc. She was paralyzed before the surgery and she remained paralyzed after the surgery. Many said we should put her down because she wouldn’t walk again. But she did!! She put up a great fight and walked again in 3 months.

What Maahi’s fight did for me was incredible! It broke my heart to pieces and then rebuilt me into a new person. I was tested on all levels like never before. I witnessed a new kind of strength and endurance that I never thought I had in me. Maahi introduced me to a new me!

I wrote a blog post about this experience in 2015 and my friend Diana posted it on FB because she thought the world should know this story. Until then, I was a super secret blogger who wrote only for myself. I only had 3 blogs on my website then and only 5-6 friends knew that it existed. Maahi’s post received more than 500 views and the post was shared by many. After that day, I never stopped writing. Maahi gave me the courage to write; she made me a spiritual and motivational blogger! I am now invited to write for a larger global audience by some organizations. Recently at a job interview, my last interview question was, “How is Maahi?” and I was taken aback! They had researched my blog and me thoroughly. At another meeting, I was told that they needed people with my grit on their team because of my experience with Maahi.

What I want to say to you is that every pet and every animal in your life has a purpose. You never know which being is going to bring you the biggest lesson of love in your life and change you forever. Be grateful for all the animals sent your way because you never know what doors may be opened for you. You will never be fully accomplished as a human being until you embrace all forms of creation. Celebrate Nature with an open heart!

Happy World Health Day everyone! What better day could there be to remind ourselves that our spiritual well-being is one of the most important aspect of our overall health! Health is not only your physical health; it is also peace of mind, joy in the heart, love and laughter. On this day, embrace spirituality; start that meditation habit that you have always wanted to. Awaken and Evolve!

Spiritual evolution does not mean adding more knowledge and wisdom to your life. It does not mean becoming something more or becoming better than who you already are. It does not mean adding a new dimension to your personality. You are beautiful as you are. You are perfect. Evolution means becoming what we were when we first came on this planet. It is all about going back to that child-like innocent state. It is about unlearning everything that the society has made you to believe. It is about discarding everything that is not letting you be you. Finally, it is about finding your way back to you! ❤️

Few weeks ago I chatted with my friend, sister, and a fellow spiritual seeker from France. She is a budding spiritual blogger and I love to read her blog posts when she shares her thoughts and feelings regarding her spiritual journey. It gives me immense joy to read blogs of people’s spiritual evolution no matter at what stage they are in. However, while chatting, she expressed a concern to me. She worried that people may not want to read her blog or may not like her blog. What then? I could relate to her fear because I felt the same when I started writing my blog.

So often we worry about what other people may think of us without realizing that we may actually be keeping them away from experiencing a valuable lesson or truth through us. Maybe what you have to share is exactly what they are seeking at that moment. I have had so many people write to me letting me know how helpful and timely my posts have been for them. This has reinforced my blogging habit even more. Sharing your spiritual truth through your story only shows your desire and willingness to help others.

Want to try writing your first spiritual blog post? I know many of you would like to share your experiences but do not go ahead with that idea because you get in your own way. I am sharing some pointers that helped me let go of my inhibitions and share my spiritual journey with you all.

1) Meditate Before You Write: Honestly, all my blog posts occur only after I meditate. My ideas come to me when I meditate. I never decide on a particular topic to write my post. The topic just happens to me. I always pray for an idea that is going to be useful for my readers in their day-to-day lives and their daily struggles.

2)Do Not Write With an Agenda: Write because you want to share your truth and help others through your writing. Do not write with an inner motive. Don’t worry about people liking or not liking your blog. Remember, you are writing from your heart and when you write with authenticity, your writing will attract the people with whom your writing resonates. Even if you touch one person through your writing, you will have justified the purpose of your blog. Quality of your readers matters more than quantity of readers.

3)Get a Reality Check on Validation: Validation is good! It is always nice to hear good things about your blog from people. After all, you wrote it to benefit others. However, don’t let it bother you if you don’t hear back from your friends and family right away. When you write with a pure heart, you will automatically have no agenda and you are doing a service to the Universe. You are fulfilling your role in the Divine Plan.

4) Collaboration, Not Competition: When it comes to spirituality and writing about it, we cannot compete with other writers. You are unique and so are your experiences and that is what makes you special. Don’t compare yourself with others. We have all learned different spiritual lessons so we will always have enough topics to write about without competing with each other. Instead, let us encourage and motivate each other. There is a lot of spiritual work to be done on this planet and each one of us is responsible for our own little role in raising the cumulative consciousness of this planet. Collaboration, not competition is the key here. Inspire and be inspired when you write.

5) Make It About Others; Not About You: The best writing often happens when you make it about others. Always ask yourself, how your post is helping another human being. Are you providing them with a tool to overcome their situation? Are you helping them shift their attitude towards positivity? Are you raising their consciousness? Always write with the intention to lift others and not only yourself through your writing. Be of service to another human being through every word you share. Always create conscious content.

6) Write From Experience Only: You can only write the truth when you experience it yourself. I have stressed this point several times in my blog. You cannot write a successful blog from borrowed wisdom. Only you can share your truth. Similarly, you will not find success in sharing somebody else’s truth. Your spiritual story is so much beautiful than anybody else’s. Getting an inspiration from someone is good but telling your own story is great!

7) Do Not Postpone Greatness: Finally, sit down and write when a great idea comes to you. Commit yourself to it and bring it to life. Don’t postpone it for tomorrow. The only thing that we are certain of in life is this particular moment. If you let this moment pass by without taking any action, it may also take your great idea along with it and you may never have access to it again.

8) The Ultimate Secret: Have you ever wondered why people blog? What are they receiving from it? Authentic spiritual writers don’t care about how many likes they receive on their posts or how their blog statistics changes on a day-to-day basis. They go on writing without stopping. Do you know why? They write because they learn so much from their readers. Every new post is a new learning and growing experience for them. When we help others grow by sharing our own truth, we ourselves grow and gain more wisdom. When we gain more wisdom, we get more ideas to write about and this becomes a continuous cycle.

Finally, I would like to say, always write with an attitude of gratitude. Write because you care and you genuinely want to help others to be their best version. It doesn’t matter who you are, where you come from or how old you are; we are all storytellers and we all have a story. And a story lived by faith is the most beautiful truth you can share to inspire others. Happy blogging!

Oops, have you created digital impressions? Has your digital karma gone viral? What now? Have you struggled to draw a fine line between too much social media and too little social media? I have! My dilemma has been even greater because I am a marketing professional. Constant access to new information, social media platforms, and extroversion are important factors for us marketers. But what about the yogi inside me who loves solitude, minimal access to information, and is actually an introvert? Can we really draw a balance? Continue reading my blog for social media hacks for a conscious seeker.

For the sake of easy understanding for all types of readers, I am going to use the words karma, samskara, and impressions synonymously in this post.

We are in the most exciting times of our planet’s spiritual evolution. Each one of us is making an effort to raise the global consciousness in our own way. Never before has the world witnessed so many authentic spiritual teachers appear on this planet all at once providing knowledge and wisdom on a global scale. What is it that connects us to them and their teachings? Social media! But are we making the right use of these platforms? In the beginning, we worried only about our karma; now with the social media, we also have to worry about our digital karma!

Social media platforms, texting apps, etc. are great when used as powerful tools to connect the world to raise the cumulative consciousness. However, sometimes in the process of spreading goodness, we end up creating more and more impressions or samskaras within others and us. It is extremely important for spiritual seekers of all levels to practice a mindful social media usage. Following are some pointers that you can utilize to broaden your understanding about your digital karma.

1. Digital Karma Goes Viral: Know that your digital footprint goes very far and wide. It is not just the information you create and share with others on social media but also the information that you absorb from others. You are what you think, see, eat, talk, and do. Every little thought that is created in you is a samskara (impression). If every little thought is an impression created on your heart and mind, can you imagine how many impressions get accumulated in you on a day-to-day basis? I am only talking about social media here. I haven’t even touched the topic of impressions layering upon you through words, actions, consumption of wrong food and drinks. It really is a huge burden to carry. The very first step to reduce your digital karma is to become aware of it.

2. Know the consequences of creating impressions

(on yourself): If you are a spiritual practitioner, then you are probably meditating daily. The meditation practice that I follow also has a unique method of “cleaning” our day-to-day impressions at the end of the day. So I do my regular meditation in the morning and practice my cleaning meditation at night. We work so hard on ourselves to deflate our ego through meditation and yet we can’t wait to inflate it again by asking for approval and validation from others on social media. Imagine what happens to your spiritual condition when your ego-meter keeps going up and down daily.

(on others): Creating impressions on yourself is bad enough but spreading it to others is much worse. This will have serious consequences on you and your spiritual practice in the long run. Any information that you create, share, or forward to others that could remotely create impressions of pain, anger, jealousy, sadness, etc. is ultimately your burden to carry. If you have created ripples of negative energy, you too will not be immune to it. Paint your own canvas but don’t splash your colors on others unless you can promise them a masterpiece!

3. One Step Forward and Two Steps Back: Understand that when you meditate and clean, you are getting rid of your impressions but with more involvement in social media, television, etc. you are adding those impressions back to yourself. In fact, you may be adding even more than you cleaned.

Also remember that you already have a lot of past karmas to clean out of your system, let alone the ones from today. What this means is you are working on yourself to clean impressions from the past and from the present and you are again adding more to these impressions in the present, which again have to be cleaned. Now that is a lot of work! Unfortunately, this is why you are not making any spiritual progress.

If this is the case with spiritual seekers, then what about the people who do not have a spiritual practice in their lives? What about people who don’t clean their impressions before sleeping? When we negatively affect the consciousness of such people, we intervene with the divine plan. Be digitally responsible!

4) All Good Information Is Not Really Good: Yes, that’s right! Even if you think you are doing a good service by sharing some updates or creating some information, it is not always good and necessary. What is good for me may not be good for you and vice versa. Of course, some information needs to be shared and we cannot always control how people should feel and react to it. What I would suggest here is before creating, commenting, or sharing something, take a pause. Consult your heart. It already knows what to do in every little situation. If the answer is no, then don’t go ahead creating digital pollution.

5) Show Digital Respect: If you give me 10 minutes of your life to read what I have to say and I don’t provide you with an experience that upgrades or enhances your spiritual consciousness, then I am not being respectful to you. Similarly, when you post or share something that does not add any meaning to others’ lives then you are taking away not only yours but also somebody else’s time and energy. By not being respectful of your audience’s time and energy, you are actually undermining your chances of being a positive influencer in their lives. People will stop taking you seriously.

6) Everything Begins with Self-Love: Our generation is being taught about self-love a lot these days. Yes, it’s true that if you don’t love yourself, you will not be able to love and embrace others but it has a deeper meaning. This does not mean that you go on asking for approval and validation for being who you are from others directly or indirectly through social media platforms. Also there is absolutely no need to prove anything to others. You are whole. You are enough. Learn to love and accept yourself at a soul level first. Feel the beauty of who you are deep within you. When you feel it inside, it naturally shows on the outside. Everything works from inside out and not the opposite way. So next time you want to leave a lasting “impression” on someone, think twice! 😉

7) Make them Curious: Become!! Make people curious about your spiritual practice or about any other thing that you are passionate about by “becoming it” yourself. When you “become” the change that you talk about, you will automatically attract others towards you. Once they are drawn towards your authenticity, there will be no need to bombard them with constant information through social media.

8) Hold Yourself Accountable: There was a time when I was always active on social media for personal entertainment as well as for my marketing profession. However as of today, I have been Instagram-free for quite some time and I have limited my social media time to only 10-15 minutes per day. I use Whatsapp and other text messaging only to get important things done. Once I realized that people mostly use these platforms to boost their egos and dump their insecurities, I did not want to be a part of it.

9) Create Conscious Content Only:We cannot completely avoid the use of social media but we can always create a meaningful experience out of it for ourselves and for others. Always aim to enhance somebody’s digital experience. You never know how you may end up touching the lives of other people positively. Remember what I said – digital karma goes viral! If you do something good, good digital energy is sent back to you. When people finish reading your post, their hearts should smile. Make them content with your content!

10) Be Grateful for the Gift of Social Media: Once you learn how to practice social media mindfully, you are in control of your digital destiny. You have a powerful tool at your disposal to create meaningful and authentic experiences at a global level. We are all responsible in our own way to raise the cumulative global consciousness of this planet. If social media is used correctly, our progress as a conscious human race will be faster.

After writing my last blog about “Navigating Through Spiritual Awakening,” I received an overwhelming response from you all. Many of you said you could relate to my pain, journey, or the situation. Your responses made me smile and feel one with you all. Well…now that we can identify with each other’s pain, its time to move further in the process of our spiritual evolution. It is time to surrender and go beyond! After all, how long are we going to be stuck in this phase? As spiritual seekers, there has to come a stage in our lives when we have to go beyond our pain, no matter how deep and unbearable it gets. Life is all about touching others’ lives and empowering them but how can you do it without yourself being spiritually tough.

Spiritual struggles are invisible and intangible and so are the victories. In my previous blog I said that as we evolve spiritually so do our problems. Let me elaborate a little more. In my experience, we face more challenges and our struggles become greater as we evolve spiritually. As we proceed on our spiritual path, our practice gives us more strength to face more and more. But why should we face more challenges? Shouldn’t spiritual evolution reduce our problems and make us happy? Ideally, yes! But what really is happening is Nature is constantly empowering us to overcome more. More struggles appear in our life because more strength is given to us to face them. Struggles are nothing but impressions or Samskaras waiting to be released from within you. Faster the spiritual progress, faster your impressions will leave their home and make you lighter.

So how can we hasten this process of overcoming our pain and releasing our impressions? Surrender! What exactly is surrendering and how do we surrender? I believe surrendering means loving acceptance of our current situation, pain, and suffering as we call it. How can one accept their pain and not simply accept it but accept it with love? “Accepting pain” and “love” does not even go in one sentence for most of us but it can be done and done gracefully. I am going to tell you a few things that worked for me when I went through some painful experiences.

1. Trust Nature’s Plan and Timing: Nature is your biggest healer. Learn to read the signs it sends your way. As new challenges arise, Nature constantly sends you tools to help you overcome them. If you miss some signs, don’t panic. Nature is kind; it will open more doors again and again till you have learned to peacefully accept your situation. Help always arrives in forms of spiritual teachers, mentors, speeches, articles, animals, etc. The door that is meant for you always opens exactly at the right time.

When I was going through some of the most painful situations in my life, several people came in my life to help and their timing was perfect. These people brought with themselves suggestions, advice, solutions, and answers even without me asking them. And sometimes, I asked for help. It is okay to be vulnerable and ask for help. It is okay to say you are in pain. I found my answers through these sources because I was listening and my heart was open. Your heart will always know the right source of help for you.

2. Tools Evolve And So Do You: This is a very important lesson to learn while learning to surrender. It is very easy to forget this truth. Understand that as you evolve, the tools in your life could evolve too and leave you. Spiritual evolution goes both ways. For example, if your close friend is helping you get over a problem in your life, this person may not be able to help you continuously throughout your life. When you overcome a problem, you become stronger and may not need your friend’s help anymore so they will cease to play a supportive role in your life after the situation has passed.

Secondly, the person helping you may also be evolving in his or her own life while helping you. Once they have assisted you in your situation, they may not feel the need to stick around you for long. They appeared in your life at the exact moment when you needed them and for the exact situation of which they were capable of helping you. They may or may not be able to help you at other times or in other situations.

Don’t be surprised if people who have been with you in the past are no longer in your life to help you face other situations in the future. It only means, its time to move forward. Do not hold it against them. At the end of the day, know that you are your biggest tool and the greatest help. As you evolve, your situation will no longer bother you and your version of a person in pain will leave you. You will then start being a tool for others.

3. Face Your Fear: All of our pain and suffering comes from a place of fear. Attachment, insecurity, and uncertainty are all root causes of pain leading to fear. I used to experience deep fear of certain kind of people in my life. I began noticing a certain pattern that kept repeating in my life for several years until very recently. The more I feared these people; more and more similar people started appearing in my life causing even more fear. Finally, a couple of months ago I stood up for myself and faced my fear. Similar situations will keep repeating in our lives until we learn the lessons they bring with them.

Recently, one morning I woke up and felt extremely light. My fears had left me and I felt no worries inside me about the future. It felt great to be alive and my attitude towards life had completely shifted. Fear leaving you doesn’t mean that the situation has left you. It means you have finally become capable of facing your fear and changing your situation because you are now working from a place of love.

4. Here and Now: All my life I have wanted to be “somewhere else.” Somewhere better, somewhere nicer, at some other job, in some other city, or in some other country; thinking that I would be happier somewhere else. When I began accepting my problems and challenges as they were, I began living in the moment. Now everything is “here and now” for me. I started living life to the fullest. I am spending each moment mindfully giving my attention and energy only to things and people who really matter. This present moment is my somewhere else. I am already home here and now. Does it mean you have to go on living in your currently unfavorable situation? Not at all! However, you can accept your current situation with love until it changes or until you are able to change it on your own. Nature will change your scenery when you respect its plans for you. Nature trusts you when you trust Nature.

5. Accept Others as Carriers of Their Samskaras: Surrendering becomes a lot easier when we start looking at every person as a soul who is burdened by his or her own samskaras or impressions. The soul is always pure; what we see externally is just an egoistic manifestation of that person. When we accept people as they are, we start seeing the good hidden inside them. My Master says that even our successes and failures in life are also a part of our past samskaras so it is foolish to proudly claim any success or point out to someone as a failure. Everything that happens to us and everything that we do to others is based on our impressions. Every person is fighting his or her own battles based on their samskaras or karmas. You are also behaving in certain ways with others based on your samskaras. The way you want others to accept you with your flaws, train yourself to accept others with their shortcomings.

6. Forgive, forgive, and forgive: Once you have accepted the people in your life as the carriers of their samskaras, forgiveness should come to you easily. Once we understand the person treating us wrongfully is doing this only based on their samskaras, forgive them quickly. You should also understand that their treatment towards you is also based on your past samskaras. When you forgive them, make sure you ask for forgiveness from them too at a soul level. Forgive and let go for your own spiritual evolution, if not for others. When you pray at night, ask for forgiveness from all the souls you may have wronged knowingly or unknowingly from the very beginning of your creation. It actually works!

7. Practice Thought Replacing: Thought replacing means every time you experience an angry feeling towards someone, immediately replace that thought with your purest and most loving thought. It may not be a loving thought for that particular person at the beginning but just a thought that makes you immensely happy for your own sake. I always like to think about my spiritual Master at such times. When we find ourselves judging, criticizing, or ridiculing others, practice thought replacement.

8. Power of Positive Thinking: I used to underestimate the power of positive thinking for a very long time. With time, I have come to realize that the thoughts that we put out into the universe actually have vibratory power. Our actions, words, and thoughts are all forming impressions on us every single second. We have to be extremely careful of the thoughts we send out for ourselves and for others. Not only keeping our hearts pure is our responsibility but keeping Nature pure is also a bigger responsibility. We should not pollute the universe by sending out negative thoughts and feelings; they have a boomerang effect!

9. Silence is Golden: Surrendering teaches us how to be silent and silence teaches us how to surrender. Acceptance of a person, situation, or a challenge by being silent saves a lot of our spiritual energy that can be used to handle the situation at hand. Unnecessary talking, reacting, and complaining about your situation will deplete your energy and make you weak. Practice silence whenever you can.

10. Feel more, know less: Experience is everything! On a spiritual path, feeling is more important than knowing. You can’t go on feeding on the experiences and wisdom of other people in spirituality. You have to experience it yourself. When we talk about receiving transmission (Life Force) in Heartfulness meditation, it all sounds so glamorous and creates an excitement in us but it means something only when you feel it in your heart. Words can be pretty empty if you don’t experience it yourself.

I have always been a spiritual rebel even before I started with Heartfulness 10 years ago. I surrendered to my spiritual Masters only when I felt the transmission in my own heart. Until then, even their words didn’t mean anything to me. Once I felt the vibration, obedience and acceptance with love came to me naturally. I gave up on my accumulated superficial wisdom and pride and I had a lot it! I realized being is more important than knowing. So “be love” than only talk about love!

11. Heal Your Food and Water: Consuming food and water in the right state of mind is extremely important. Always eat with an attitude of gratitude. It has taken a lot of people and resources to bring you the food and water you consume. Be grateful to Nature before eating and drinking. Pray for your brothers and sisters in the world who have nothing to eat. Do what you can for such people. Be mindful of the quantity you eat. Eat only what is necessary for your body.

12. Be Grateful for the Animals in Your Life: You may ask what has the animal kingdom got to do with surrendering. My extremely painful and eye-opening journey towards surrender began with my dog Maahi. Most of you have read that blog and will know what I had to go through to surrender to Nature. You never know which being is going to bring you the biggest lesson of love in your life and change you forever. Be grateful for all the animals sent your way for they have a purpose to fulfill in your life. You will never be fully accomplished as a spiritual seeker until you embrace all beings of Nature. We cannot love only people or children and not develop equal compassion for animal and plant life. Celebrate Nature with an open heart!

13. Health is Wealth: At the end, everything I mention above ultimately affects your health. Fear affects us the most. Not forgiving someone and holding on to that pain will steal the peace of your mind. Not thinking positively and constantly brooding over negativities in life will hurt you in the long run. Not eating and drinking food and water mindfully will also affect your health. All this will definitely affect your sleep pattern and eventually your meditation practice. We will experience body ailments and lack of energy. So surrendering is also good for our overall health! 🙂

14. Empower Others:My Master says, “When in pain, find another soul in inextricable pain and help them.” This has helped me a lot in my personal life. Always find opportunities to touch somebody’s life. Transmit love to them through your words, deeds, or even by your presence in the room. Make yourself so pure that your presence in the room uplifts everyone’s spirit. Inspire others to live the highest and purest version of themselves. Walk away by leaving love in the hearts of others.

15. Surrender Daily: Everyday is a new beginning; everyday is an opportunity to surrender better than the previous day. Accept, forgive, let go, and live in the moment whenever faced by a challenging situation. Choose to feel the purity of another’s soul rather than seeing the external ego of that person. Surrendering does not make you weak; it makes you stronger like never before.

Finally, I would like to sign off by saying that surrender doesn’t happen overnight. Surrendering needs practice and constant hard work. As we evolve, surrendering will also evolve at each step. Bigger the challenge, higher the level of surrender needed! Eventually, the process becomes beautiful and you will find joy in it. You will find the purest and lightest version of yourself on the other side of surrender. You will experience innocence in your spirit; the same innocence that existed at the time of creation. You will become love for love is the other name for surrender. So what are you waiting for? See you on the other side! 🙂

“Take off your sunglasses Sayali,” said Lynne when we got ready to get a picture of us together at a restaurant. I looked at her and my other friend Lenny and said, “But there is so much pain in my eyes. I don’t want anyone to see that.” This happened almost three months ago and my sentence continued to haunt me. Exactly after that pic was posted on Facebook, my friend from India said to me, “Your social life looks so great on Facebook!” I remember saying to myself, “everyone’s social life looks great when they are hiding behind their blue Ray-Bans.”

Last few months had been extremely challenging for me on all fronts of my life. Misunderstandings, betrayals, abandonment, and disappointments from self and others had all happened to me at the same time. Coping with everything all at once seemed to be impossible. The only thing that kept me going was my meditation practice. On some days, I did not have the energy to even sit straight and meditate. The words of my spiritual Master, “Come back with the shield or on it!” echoed in my mind even more during this phase. How was I ever going to be a spiritual Spartan with extreme lack of interest and will to do anything? On some days, I was just lying on the floor staring into nothingness and losing my appetite with each passing day. In less than three months, I had lost 12 lbs . I honestly thought that this phase was not going to pass and it would only end with me. More than eight months had passed and I was navigating through one issue after another.

Most of you have read my previous post, “Transformation or Confusion?” so you will already know that during this period I was also experiencing a spiritual transformation or a spiritual shift within me. We all evolve continuously in our spiritual journey, which eventually leads to our spiritual awakening. I remember reading a beautiful quote by Deepak Chopra – “All great changes are preceded by chaos” and that is exactly what was going on with me. I was moving between spiritual points. According to my experience when one moves from one spiritual point to another, a lot of chaos, confusion, lack of interest, and pain is experienced. You are shedding your old skin and getting ready to start a new spiritual phase of your life. A lot of cleansing is happening within you. A spiritual shift is always a painful process no matter how beautiful and attractive words like spiritual awakening or spiritual enlightenment sound.

So what are these spiritual points that I talk about? All human beings have a spiritual anatomy that consists of the chakras or points that have concentrated divine energy. Each of this point has it’s own sub points. There are 13 main points that start at our heart and end at the back of our head. You can view this diagram here on page 16 of the book called “Towards Infinity.” (1) As our spiritual practice evolves, we move further along the path of these points and start experiencing the subtle energy or the transmission (Life Force) at these points.

When I look back today, it is clearer to me why my life was a roller coaster in last few months. In my case, most of my Samskaras (or the past impressions that were accumulated in me) had finally started surfacing with a severe intensity begging only to be released. It felt like all the past impressions stored within me so far had decided to leave their home at the same time and confront me. However, I was always reassured time and again that I was not the first one going through this and I will not be the last one to experience this. I was told that this is how the process of spiritual evolution worked and acceptance is the key.

I have personally observed that as we evolve spiritually, so do our problems. Does this mean spiritual evolution brings a lot of problems leading to pain in our lives? Yes and no! Spiritual awakening means you are becoming aware of your true nature. You are letting go of your old impressions, perceptions, lessons, beliefs, or even people that no longer serve your spiritual growth or hinder your spiritual evolution. This process is painful only because we are leaving our comfort zones to accomplish something bigger and higher and dive deeper into the spiritual realm. These are the growing pains of spiritual awakening.

It will stop being painful as soon as we accept the situation and surrender to Nature. Accepting and surrendering is not something we humans are good at. Holding on to the current situation means security and comfort for our ego even though we may be suffering due to it. Letting go, surrendering, forgiving, accepting, or simply being present in the moment can be the lessons that come your way during your spiritual awakening process. Each one of us gets sent different lessons and our only choice to move forward at a faster pace is to accept and learn these lessons as quickly as possible.

In my case, I was sent all these lessons at once. I had to learn how to accept, forgive, let go, and surrender all at the same time. People always advice us to forgive but nobody tells us how to forgive. They tell us to surrender but nobody tells us how to surrender. While these are the things that we all learn on our own, Nature always sends us enough tools to overcome every obstacle, spiritual or physical. Only we need to know how to find these tools and use them for our benefit. I will talk more about “tools during spiritual awakening” in the part 2 of this blog post.

For now, I am going to sign off by saying that as you proceed on your spiritual path, you will cross various points and experience several spiritual shifts throughout your life. Sometimes, crossing over from one point to another takes months or even years and at other times you are on the other side in a matter of minutes. It all depends on your faith, intensity of your spiritual practice, Nature’s grace, and most importantly your ability to surrender with love.

Remember, spiritual awakening does not happen as a separate process within you hidden from the whole world. It happens while you are very much a part of this world. Situations and people in our lives bring these lessons to us. How else are we going to learn? Sometimes, the lessons are painful but we need to know that we are all each other’s solutions and not problems. So do not react with hatred and anger when somebody wrongs you. If you do, then it only means that your ego is reacting towards the ego of another human being. It then becomes an ego war; the war of impressions or Samskaras.

So let’s stop magnifying our illusions and proceed like real spiritual Spartans! Let’s work on ourselves from a place of love rather than a place of fear. If you feel pain in your heart, it only means you are alive and your soul is sending you a signal to do something about it. When you start getting these signals, embrace that pain with grace. Pain passes through you gracefully, when you pass through pain gracefully!

…to be continued. Stay tuned for the part 2 of this post! I will talk more about how you can find tools during your spiritual awakening process. Wearing your Ray-Bans is definitely not going to be on that list! 🙂